


Relations

by Code16



Series: Just World [2]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Slavery, Beating, Broken John, Corporal Punishment, Electrocution, Enslaved Mages, Gags, Injury, Internalized, Mentions of Blood, Other, Punishment, Self Condemnation, Torture, Unconsciousness, Victim Blaming, Whipping, agony beams, brief mention of broken bones, stress positions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-04
Updated: 2016-06-04
Packaged: 2018-07-12 07:18:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7091230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Code16/pseuds/Code16
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“When’s Agent Stanton supposed to be back, anyway?” It occurs to John belatedly that the liaison might not know John actually can’t talk at all through the gag. (Kara’d wanted the electric gag. Better reminder, fitting, but either she hadn’t packed it this time or it had gotten lost somehow. So this one's just there for now, reminder to keep his mouth shut the way the bruises under his clothes are a reminder of loyalties.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Liaison

**Author's Note:**

> As per the series, mages in this world are considered dangerous by nature, put in collars that restrain their powers, and enslaved. John here currently works for/is owned by the CIA.
> 
> Again, please heed the torture tags and the self condemnation/internalized/broken John tags. This is not a nice story, physically or psychologically.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> World info: there are supply stores that basically sell torture devices to use on mages, and CIA mages are expected to give new handlers lists of most effective ways to hurt them.

John hears the footsteps behind him when the liaison gets up. Moving further away - toward the side wall of the warehouse, John thinks. Then stopping and partially returning.

“You’d better not get any ideas from those senses of yours. Don’t think I can’t see you just because I’m not sitting there. You touch that table, you even reach for it, and I’m putting you back over it.”

 _I wouldn’t_ , John won’t of course say. It’s wrong, thinking so highly of himself. Won’t point out that with this level of suppression from his collar the only way he’d notice the liason through those senses would be if he magically exploded. Couldn’t say any of that even if he would have, not through the gag. Can’t acknowledge the liaison, even. Acknowledges as he can in spirit by staying where he is, hands locked behind his head, feet off his heels on the floor, holding him, knees bent and drawn up. Not that he would have done otherwise, had the liason not said anything. But it’s what he can do.

The liaison’s new, John thinks. Early assignments, probably just out of training. Wasn’t paying much attention in parts of his training, was he, Kara’d said, derisive, showing him around the first time. “I’d think they’d have taught you not to jump at mages.” He doesn’t jump, exactly. But he covers for a flinch when John drops the scryer he’s working on to kneel in front of him, won’t say his name in front of John. 

( _“Is it true you can curse someone if you know their name?”_ John’s pretty sure the liaison thought Kara wasn’t listening at that point. “No,” he says, because direct questions get answers.  And adds, because he doubts that was enough to help that much “Your life force protects you from most direct magic. Immediate or delayed. And your name’s just a word.” 

“He’s a mage, Hanes, not a wizard, or whatever nonsense you saw on TV.” Kara was, of course, listening. The shock she delivers makes John double over, expectation of it not nearly enough to help him. That’s good. “John, shut your mouth and get back to work, we don’t bring you here for remedial education.”)

John wonders a few times if the liaison (he’s careful not to think of him by name until the liaison says it after all - too easy to slip in reality and that’s beyond intolerable, threatening his handlers, even if the threat is only unreal). If the liason’s been sent here for remedial education, in some sense. Kara rolls her eyes and suggests uncomplimentary things about his training, but she explains to him that John can’t be a shapeshifter either, has John take his clothes off to show he’s not hiding anything, has the liaison be the one to take the strap to him, before the mission and after it. (His technique, John can note, is fine. He might have done perfectly well in training right up to the point where an actual mage was involved). Kara can leave John with the liaison now and he’s not without nervousness but he covers better, that put-on bravado that tends to be the stage right after flinching, but he’s not flinching anymore. 

–

“When’s Agent Stanton supposed to be back, anyway?” It occurs to John belatedly that the liaison might not know John actually can’t talk at all through the gag. Or else he’s just not thinking things through much. Not much John can do about that either, in any case. 

Kara  _had_  explained the gag, before she’d left. The length of it, the way it pushes into his throat. Would suffocate him, if he weren’t a mage, but he is, so it’s just there, reminder to keep his mouth shut the way the bruises under his clothes are a reminder of loyalties.

Kara’d  _wanted_  the electric gag. Better reminder, fitting, but either she hadn’t packed it this time or it had gotten lost somehow. (He’d expected to be accused of taking it, but while she wouldn’t, of course, trust him, she’s certainly not the kind of handler to think she might have ever left her bag unlocked. She asks him anyway, of course - sends shocks through him till he’s curled on the ground, till repeating that he didn’t (of course it’s something someone like him would do, but he didn’t) becomes less words and more something he forces out between the spasms. But she’d accepted the answer). So she’d pulled up their train schedule, and a map, and found a store nearby enough, and went to correct the lack. So he’d been left here in the interim, other gag and the liaison and Kara’s order to stay still and not make trouble. 

He’s grateful, for Kara. He’s not to call her Agent Stanton, but it seems one of the rare things he might share with the liaison, appreciation. Kara, who never hesitates with shocks or blows, who’d taken him to a supply store to make selections almost as soon as first getting him. Who, given his list, had asked what what he wanted to do first and read it out to watch him for reactions. Who’d been the one to decide, after that incident with the field mage John had worked with last assignment, that he should be whipped at mission beginning and end, even if he’d done nothing on the mission to earn further punishment. (And, as he was finding out now, if he had.) 

 _A month or two, at least_ , she told him, once the minders had given him back to her. He’d wanted to crawl to her and kiss the floor at her feet, lungs unclenching somewhere for the first time since he’d heard the news, that had left him shaking in a way entirely orthogonal to the 36 straight hours they’d interrogated him.  _Working with Amis, did you notice anything that might have raised suspicion?_  And he hadn’t, he’d searched his mind, every memory, and he hadn’t. And he knew no harm had been done - this was the  _reason_  tests were swapped in for mission work at whatever unknown regularity, none of them with any way to predict when or how often. So that deception could be caught in time. It’s still terrifying, not assuaged by the interrogation, not assuaged enough by the warning, reminder, they’d all gotten. 

 _Falsified his report. Liar._  John rechecks his reports three times a piece and it’s not enough, if he wanted to lie repetition would offer no protection. But Kara’s watching him. He’s had handlers who didn’t care to deal with him much, left him to the minders at base, and it’s not his right to hold opinions on their methods, not his place. But Kara had handed him the strap to work spells into, so it’ll swing with more than her full strength without her needing to spend much of it, told him she won’t be tying him down and he’d best stay where he’s put, and he’s more grateful than feels like it might fit in him. 

(He never knows what to do, with gratitude. Can’t try harder, at work, at behavior, because there should be no harder, if he’s failing to give all he has that’s unconscionable. Can defer beyond what’s simply his place to do for all his handlers and masters, can try to say it, now and then, even if the latter earns him warnings more often than not and the former does with regularity.  _If you think it’ll get you something nice if you play up to me-_. He doesn’t, and he won’t say that because it’s wrong, they’re right to suspect him of course, to give no benefit of doubt. But he’s grateful, still and all.)

–

The liaison’s back again.

“Agent Stanton says there’s traffic, and you get another round.” That’s a good idea, having the liaison try this on his own but in such controlled circumstances. (Not his place, to have an opinion on how Kara does something. But it’s likely to be good for the liaison, in this). 

John knows not to get up until he’s actually told to (or else shocked or kicked over for not having done it already). The liason isn’t at going for the latter, yet.

“Are you getting up? I can make you. I’m not your handler, but Agent Stanton said-” John thinks he can take that as an order. Succeeds in not falling over when standing up, turns to the table, finds the button of his waistband. The liaison telegraphs with the shock stick, hesitates like pulling a punch before it touches. It’s not a punch, so this hardly matters - it’s just as effective, whichever way. When his molecules stop feeling pulled apart John finishes with his clothes, moves back to where he’d been maybe an hour before. 

The liaison, John finds out almost immediately, starts slipping in technique when Kara isn’t here. John tries for his best impression of a training mannequin, though it’s harder when blows land over such recent bruises, harder again when the liaison misses in aim and they’re over the tendons at his knees, the joint of his hip. (Kara, minders, go for that on purpose often enough, and the liaison could, of course; whatever restraint he might be shown, it’s to his masters’ judgement only. But John’s been used in training often enough to know lack of assurance, when he feels it). 

As often, a few minutes without John doing much except holding himself down, rectifying his position when there’s a blow he can’t quite take in stillness or in silence, helps with confidence. Technique, aim, regain training form; strength behind swings steadies in consistency. Then escalates. The spell on the strap (Kara had shown it to the liaison, explained it) keeps doing its work, amplifying force put into it. John clutches at the table harder as the blows go from bruising to cutting into his skin at the edge, drags practice, willpower, into keeping his legs somewhere close to where they belong. Tries not to choke where his breathing attempts to exceed the channel his power makes for it. 

 _Diminished responsiveness to a negative or aversive stimulus after repeated exposure to it._  There’s an effect humans experience, John had learned once - desensitization, in some meaning, habituation. Not what that means, much, how it works, for humans or for mages - a hospital mage might know, but his own medical learning doesn’t go much farther than the field. But he remembers the first training he’d been used for, back in the army, the private who’d touched him with the shock stick when he’d been cut down from the post, not permitted enough healing yet to stand.  _Does that even hurt them. After-_  (he’d indicated the post, probably, or the whip. Or John, maybe). 

 _Yes_ , John wouldn’t have said if he could have. The sergeant had jammed the shock stick into his stomach, against his back where marks hadn’t even started closing yet, until John shook and sobbed again and screamed into the gag.  _Sure. Even a rat’s got some qualities. Don’t bleed to death, don’t scar. Don’t get used to things_.

It’s not wholly true - he can adjust, accustom, learn a new place, like from before to the army, army to the CIA. But it’s true enough. The same power that keeps him breathing, that’ll heal him slowly but sure even without permission, that keeps blood in his body and sepsis away - the same means that the minders can break both his arms in three places but a switch won’t be any less vicious, then, or the next time, or the next. (That’s good, of course. He’s trouble enough to his masters as he is, threat enough, without growing in it, like an illness that comes to resist the cure.  _Some qualities_.)

“Did you pass out now?” John comes aware to the shock stick sending lightning through him again, the liaison’s voice closer than before. He’d choked after all, then, his body needing unconsciousness to get his breathing in order again. Hadn’t slipped off the table, somehow.  _I’m sorry_ , he still can’t say. Turns his head enough to see the liaison, who’s rubbing his arm, stops as soon he notices John. Switches the shock stick to his other hand and hits him with it again. 

“Don’t look at me. And get back to how you were, Agent Stanton’s coming back soon.” From the lack of the strap in his hand and his glance at the floor, John figures out which ‘how you were’ must be the one in question. Gets up, breathes through the rushing in his head, fixes his clothes. Lowers himself back down, locks his hands over his head. (Most trainees just tired themselves out, though pulled muscles weren’t entirely uncommon. John wonders which it is for a moment, then pushes the thought away.  _Agent Stanton’s coming back soon_ ).   


	2. Agent Stanton's coming back soon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In disclaimers that feel somewhat strange but I feel I should make: the way that Kara is treating Hanes in in fact also not good.

Kara, of course, is his handler. Even at this suppression he can feel her when she’s just outside, when she walks in, even before she’s in his line of sight. No bags to show for where she’d been - but it would fit in her purse, of course. Stops the liaison short with a look when he runs out to meet her.

“Hanes, quit freaking out on me; he passed out, he’s back, he’s a mage not your understudy. Try again, you’ll figure it out.” The liaison nods like taking notes from the font of wisdom before seeming to realize she meant that literally.

“Agent Stanton, I - I think I may have gone too far, I’m sorry, I-”

“Is he dead?” The liaison, of all things, actually throws a look at John. “Then you didn’t go too far.” 

“But-”

“It happens. Don’t overdramatize. He doesn’t even need healing. Though we can ask, if you’re so worried.

“John?” Usually a question like that gets a specific answer - can he stand, can he walk, can he hold a working. (If it’s even asked. Deterrence for lying notwithstanding, most handlers preferred to make the call themselves.) But it’s a fairly universal reply at the moment. John shakes his head, careful to stay balanced.

“And is there any reason - of yours - Hanes here shouldn’t get himself some extra practice?” That’s barely even a question. John shakes his head again, waits for Kara’s “Table” to stand, put himself ready.

Now that Kara’s back she’s loosed the suppression enough that John can feel both of them behind him - Kara when she picks up the strap, the liaison watching her, nervousness still overt. Can tell Kara’s looking at him; knows what she’d see, bloody lines crisscrossing his skin over the bruises, the lines that hadn’t cut. She directs the liaison over. 

”Take a look. Another one now that you’re paying the right attention. I asked, he said he doesn’t need healing. If he said he had, this would be where I call to base and tell them they’ll have some work to do. Some more work, in this case. Then I’d demonstrate the difference between what needs healing and what doesn’t. Since he remembered not to lie, you can keep with practice. Come over here.” The liaison doesn’t. Steps back, almost, tries to look somewhere else.

I - I’m injured. My arm-”

“I’ve been looking at you for the past minute. Your arm’s fine. But John can take a look at it, if you’d like.”

“No - you’re right, I’m good.” (John wonders somewhere if the liaison will have this problem if he needs a hospital, or if it’s him as a CIA field mage only. Wishes he might have helped more, but it’s like with trainees again - after the first few times Kara took him to the ground to make it clear she had him in control, there just isn’t much he can  _do_.)

”We can hope. Lets try this again.  

“This,” she holds the strap up to him once he’s walked over. “Has a working on it. Amplifies force. Don’t stand where I’m swinging.

“This.” John flinches into the wood, roots himself in place. Kara, of course, has impeccable aim. “Is how you use it. Gets his attention, won’t tire you out. Or hurt your arm.

“This.” It’s closer to her full strength, and John clutches the table again, bites into the gag. “Is fine a few time. Emphasis. Don’t keep doing it; you really will hurt yourself. You want something more severe than a strap, get it. Keep a selection. You want blood, get something that’s supposed to do that. Ask an overseer at home, ask a store attendant. They’ll explain what you need, they’ll even demonstrate. And I said, stop freaking out. You did fine your first two times. Try again.” She starts to give the strap to him. “Think you can handle that?”

“I- of- I mean- yes-.” He takes it, looks at John again. “I’ll try, Agent Stanton.” 

“You do that. Don’t wait, we still have a train.”

**Author's Note:**

> [My tumblr for these kinds of things](http://findundergrounddragoutofwater.tumblr.com). I love fandom social things, and anyone who feels like they might want to message etc me for any reason is encouraged to totally do so.


End file.
